Tag Archives: Cardozo

After a leisurely day of walking to Union Square for kale, and then down to Washington Square Park to enjoy my free sample of pita chips and hummus, the Jurist EIC gives me a ring and asks if I want to write one final column.

Anyways, here is my column, reposted, and obviously not copy-edited. I think I use three different styles for writing Cardozo Dean of Career Services.

Max Fischer said that the key to happiness is finding something you love to do and then doing it for the rest of your life.

I would guess that Dean Fama has found happiness.

In an open letter to Cardozo, Fama explained that he will be leaving his position as Dean of Career Services to merge his yoga and career counseling experience by developing yoga and relaxation programs for lawyers and law students.

But for the rest of us, it often feels like happiness is slightly out of reach. Heck, a legal job with a salary that will let one make student loan payments will suffice.

But Fama’s project sounds very interesting, and I have many questions about it. For example: Is he hiring?

Indeed, there is a bit of an image problem when a law school’s Dean of career services leaves for a non-legal job. Although that seems to be the new standard: go to law school but then not get a job in the legal industry. Of course, this begs the question of why go to law school in the first place?

Well, the free yoga classes weren’t bad.

Admittedly, Fama’s relaxation techniques are a great way to deal with the still tightening legal market and overall stress of the legal industry. But I can think of a great way to relieve student stress without resorting to mystical breathing techniques of the Orient.

Jobs.

So as Cardozo begins the search for a new Dean of Career Services, I have a recommendation. We’ve had a yoga instructor, and that was great. But this time, let’s try out a weightlifter.

Rather than teach students how to relax when we don’t get jobs, the next dean of career services should help students build the muscle necessary to shovel through the layers of bullshit it takes to get a job these days. We need a terrifying, muscle-bound dean to run around 55 5th ave, yelling at girlymen students about how they need to pump up their resumes. Instead of teaching students how to be flexible, Cardozo needs someone to help mold students into perfect specimens of legal Adonises. The point of law school is to get a law job. Cardozo should find someone who lives, eats and breathes the legal industry, and then turns it into a powder form that he can mix into a smoothie and jam it down students’ throats.

Law students are supposed to be adults who can take care of their own problems. But if OCS has demonstrated anything, it is that many students won’t take the proper job search steps without someone there to hold their hands. The next dean needs to embrace this duty with full intensity, taking those hands and forcing them to write cover letters until they have jobs, not unlike handcuffing a fat kid to a treadmill.

So as we 3L’s cross the stage at graduation, often jobless and in debt, I cannot help but wonder whether we, too, will one day match Dean Fama’s happiness.

Well, I may not have a job, but I wrote for the Cardozo Jurist. What did you ever do?

He is right, not all lawyers dedicate themselves to universal justice. But I would argue that the legal industry overall does a better job preserving the rights and liberties of U.S. citizens than the military does. So where is our holiday?

I wrote a column. The style reminds me a lot of my later work on the Thresher, where I had a point, but only through a layer of jokes or metaphors. I didn’t know what I was going to write for this issue, and then suddenly the topic came to me after the first day of the semester and I saw overflowing ash trays and cigarette butts all over the sidewalk in front of Cardozo. Honestly, majority of the time writing this column was spent trying to determine the perfect band to fit the tableau of a high school, weeknight concert. Some people recommended the Strokes, but I thought it was a bit too mainstream. Joy Division was too old. Republica, I think, was a good choice and also a subtle Venture Brothers reference.

Once I got through there, the rest flowed pretty well. The cigarette fairy part is stolen from Brett and Dan, though I think any jokes coming from 251 are officially joint works under WIPO. Honestly, this is a column I have been wanting to write since junior year at Rice, when we would mock the girls and their gay friend who smoked cigarettes outside the Hanszen servery, and then just throw their butts on the ground.

And the part about cigarettes as some Antionettian opulence is stolen directly from an IM conversation with Sara Franco.

For my Entertainment and Media Law class at Cardozo, I wrote a paper about the legal ramifications of Rice University selling the KTRU license and transmitter. I think it was an A- paper, which I suppose is pretty good. (The professors never responded with a direct grade for the paper, only for the overall class.) Anyways, here in the paper, in which I quote myself (pdf: Mintz KTRU legal) :

I. Introduction and History

A. Selling College Radio Stations

On December 5, 2010, the New York Times ran an article titled “Waning Support for College Radio Sets Off a Debate.”1 The article brought to national attention the problem of universities selling their college radio stations, notably addressing the recent controversies surrounding the sale of Rice University’s KTRU and Vanderbilt University’s WRVU. Since the article was published, Vanderbilt has not solidified any sale of its station. However, Rice University has continued with a sale marred by secrecy and controversy, and is currently waiting for the FCC to approve the license transfer that would allow the University of Houston to take over the frequency, turning KTRU into a classical music KUHC and the University of Houston’s current station KUHF into a 24-hour NPR station.2

Opponents of the sale have provided many reasons for their anger about and opposition to the sale. On the student and alumni side, Rice University has not provided any formal study justifying the sale and sold the station without discussion with the students and alumni who created and managed the station.3 The resulting sale will eliminate a source of media and broadcast education for students and will destroy a link with the surrounding city, local art establishment, and minority community, all contrary to the university’s previously stated goals.4

From the perspective of non-student or alumni opponents to the sale, removing KTRU from the airwaves would eliminate a unique, and award winning, source of music that cannot be found elsewhere in the local radio market.5 Furthermore, the secrecy of the deal was in potential violation of Texas’ Open Meetings Act.6

B. How Has the FCC Looked At Selling Radio Stations?

While monetary concerns, misleading university administrators, and musical aesthetics may make for good protest rhetoric, they do not make a cohesive legal argument against the sale of the KTRU frequency. In fact, in its Opposition to the Petition to Deny, Rice University specifically latched onto this framing of arguments against the transfer as programming-related arguments.7 From this perspective the Commission’s precedent is established: “the Commission does not scrutinize or regulate programming, nor does it take potential changes in programming formats into consideration in review assignment application.” 8

In the past the courts have scrutinized programming out of concern of preserving unique content on the airwaves. In Citizens Committee to Keep Progressive Rock v. F.C.C., the D.C. Circuit stated that it was “in the public interest, as that was conceived of by a Congress representative of all the people, for all major aspects of contemporary culture to be accommodated by the commonly-owned public resources whenever that is ethnically and economically feasible.” 9 While the court refused to distinguish between types of music — “one man’s Bread is the next man’s Bach” — it held that it was “in the public’s best interest to have all segments represented.”10 However, since 1977 the FCC has established that it would allow market forces to determine the broadcast station’s format.11 Furthermore, deregulation of the airwaves at the end of the Carter Administration and beginning of the Reagan Administration eliminated the 1971 Ascertainment Primer and the Renewal Primer that the court relied upon in Citizens Committee, creating less stringent requirements for license applications and renewals.12

While the FCC no longer concerns itself with the content of broadcasts, there is still the question of whether the specter of localism should influence the FCC’s approval of the KTRU sale. In this paper, I will address the concerns of localism as they apply in FCC regulations, and specifically look at Rice University’s recommendation in its Opposition to Petition to Deny that Internet radio over cellular phones serve as an adequate substitute for FM radio.13

II. Localism on the Radio

A. How Does Localism Apply?

1. Localism and KTRU

The Commission has in the past recognized localism as an important part of its charge. In its recent Report on Localism, the FCC has called the concept of localism “a cornerstone of broadcast regulation.” 14 As Friends of KTRU pointed out in its Petition to Deny, this localism mandate extends not just to the availability of a radio signal in a local community, but rather to the ability of that community to transmit issues of local importance over the airwaves and provide “their own media for local expression.”15 Indeed, the Commission has held that “broadcasters are obligated to operate their stations to serve the public interest — specifically, to air programming responsive to the needs and issues of the people in their communities of license.16 From the perspective of FCC rhetoric, KTRU supporters are in a proper position to argue that transferring the license would result in an important loss of local music and media. KTRU programs such as the Local Show, MK Ultra, Vinyl Frontier, Genetic Memory, and the Revelry Report showcase local artists and discuss issues specific to the Houston music community that cannot be found elsewhere on the local airwaves.17 Furthermore, KTRU also provides minority-oriented programing, such as Navrang, which focuses on music from the Indian subcontinent, and Africana, which focuses on music from the African diaspora. In a city where the Nigerian ex-patriot population totals more than 80,000 and more than 4 percent of the entire city population was born in Asia, these shows provide for the local community in ways that other FM stations do not.18 As the Commission instructs, “[t]he principle of localism requires broadcasters to take into account all significant groups within their communities when developing balanced, community-responsive programming, including those groups with specialized needs and interests.”19 These niche shows, with their local DJs, certainly are community-responsive. On the other hand, not one single program will be added to the station after the sale that will be specific to the local Houston community, only adding syndicated and national shows like BBC World News, the Diane Rehm Show, Fresh Air With Terry Gross, BBC World Have Your Say, Talk of the Nation, The World, Beutche Welle Newslink Plus, Tell Me More, and The Story.20 Given the comparison between the station offerings before and after the sale, it seems like the transfer could be denied on localism grounds. However, the Commission has not always applied its ideals of localism in a strict manner.

2. Localism as applied by the FCC and Media Bureau

While rhetoric and written policy by the Commission has emphasized the importance of localism in broadcasting, this importance has not always transferred into enforceable rules. For example, in the case of the assignment of a license of a noncommercial educational station WQEX(TV), a coalition of public-interest groups petitioned to deny the application on the ground that proposed assignee’s broadcasts “would consist almost entirely of sales presentations, with little or no noncommercial local content.” 21 However, the Commission refused to consider the argument, explaining that “the courts and Commission have repeatedly rejected arguments that would require intrusion into the format choices of broadcast licensees.”22 While WQEX concerned application of television license, the FCC Media Bureau has applied similar rationale to FM radio licenses. In the case of C-SPAN’s application for assignment of an FM radio license, some listeners objected to assigning the license because it would change “WDCU(FM)’s current jazz format to a format dedicated primarily to public affairs and news programming.” 23 Other objectors argued that the grant of application was not in the public interest “because C-SPAN’s proposed national programming does not the problems, needs and interests of the [local community].24 However, the Media Bureau letter rebutted these arguments, stating that the Commission “‘has had the appropriately limited role of facilitating the development of the public broadcasting system rather than determining the content of its programming,’” and that under well-established precedent, rather than having to actually demonstrate how it responds to the community needs, “an applicant is required to provide only a brief narrative description of its proposed community issue-responsive service.”25 In the end, the Commission approved the license. Indeed, in a this case concerning sacrificing a music station for news, with similar arguments about localism and public interest, the FCC has made its position clear, leaving KTRU supporters with little legal recourse. However, comparing application in cases with FCC rhetoric still provides a mixed message.

3. FCC Report and Rhetoric on Localism

The FCC’s 2008 Report On Broadcast Localism And Notice Of Proposed Rulemaking spends several dozen pages lamenting the problem of a lack of localism in the broadcast spectrum. Specifically, it identified the problem of broadcasters failing to serve the interests of local communities in developing and promoting local artists and in fostering musical genres.26 The report also addressed the issue of licensees grossly overstating the amount of locally oriented news programming that they offer by including commercials, weather, sports, entertainment, video news releases, and redundancy, with locally produced public affairs programming almost entirely absent.27 Furthermore, the report found that significant groups within communities were not being taken into account by broadcasters when attempting to apply the principle of localism.28

FCC Commissioners have personally expressed concern about trends against localism in the broadcast marketplace. In an address to the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, FCC Commissioner Michael Copps lamented the “homogenization and monotonous nationalized music at the expense of local and regional talent,” and proposed a system where a certain percent of programming is locally or independently produced.29 Former FCC Commissioner Rachelle Chong even used her Twitter feed to state support for KTRU and concern about the sale.30 So while past cases may not give much hope to KTRU supporters, FCC reports and statements from past and current commissioners may put enough pressure on the Media Bureau to take a hard look at localism concerns in the license transfer. However, in its Opposition to Petition to Deny, Rice University offered an alternative to assuage concerns about losing a unique and local source on the radio: Internet radio.

B. Is Internet Radio An Adequate Replacement for FM Radio?

In its Petition to Deny, KTRU stated that Web radio is not an adequate alternative to FM broadcast because it is not available in the car. Rice contends that this “ignores the increasing available of Web radio via cell phone.” 31 However, there are technological, monetary, and legal concerns as to whether Web radio over cell phones can replace FM radio for listeners.

1. Technological and Monetary Concerns

As of a Nov. 2010 report by Canalys, the most popular smartphone in the United States is the Apple iPhone, which has a 26.2 percent share of the U.S. market.32 The iPhone is currently available only on the AT&T network.33 AT&T’s high use, DataPro plan provides 2GB of data for $25 per month, and $10 for every additional 1GB.34 The average radio stream is 128 kilobits per second, equaling 16 kilobytes per second, equaling 57.6 megabytes per hour. By this math, it would take approximately 34.7 hours of listening to the radio per month to exceed the set data allotment by AT&T and incur additional charges. Merely a bit more than one hour of radio via an iPhone per day would use more data than what AT&T foresees in its highest use plan. In a city where the average commute is around 28 minutes, it is not difficult to imagine someone spending more than 34.7 hours listening to the radio in the car over the period of a month.35 Therefore, in addition to the one-time cost of purchasing an iPhone 4 for $199, or iPhone 3GS for $99, a regular KTRU listener would spend $25 per month to listen in the car, and an avid listener would spend $35 or more per month, meaning $300 or $420 per year. At the high end, this would require the average American to spend 15 percent more on entertainment than the current average annual expenditure of $2,698.36 This additional spending may be cost restrictive for many listeners. On the other hand, one can buy an FM radio for the one-time cost of $9.99.37 While Rice University may have an optimistic view about the ability of Web radio over cell phones to replace FM radio, crunching the numbers reveals that the hardware investment and price of use may make access overly cost restrictive for former KTRU fans. Unless the university is willing to help pay for listeners’ new cell phone bills, it may have an ill-informed perspective on current Internet costs and availability.

2. Legal Concerns

Even if there were not a monetary restriction on the ability of Web radio to replace FM radio, there is still a concern as to whether the FCC could justify eliminating a local source in the FM spectrum because it is otherwise available in the Internet. The Federal Communications Law Journal argues that inherent scarcity of the electromagnetic spectrum mandates that public interest obligations still remain enforced, stating that “despite the motley of other media outlets available-Internet radio, satellite radio, cable and digital television, and the like-the reason underlying such obligations in the first place is still present: electromagnetic spectrum is still scarce.”38 However, unlike various other media sources, radio’s pervasiveness in combination with its scarcity necessitates regulation. Furthermore, a strictly enforced market-based approach will only lead to, and arguably has led to, the creation of technology haves and have nots.39 Indeed, the cost restrictiveness of Web radio emphasizes the public interest charge of the FCC.

However, the FCC has addressed new technology supplanting old broadcasting in the realm of television. Currently, cable systems must carry the signals of local commercial and noncommercial broadcast stations in their local markets, while satellite carriage of local broadcasts is only required in Alaska and Hawaii.40 The FCC has expressed concern that in a small group of cases, the system used to define local broadcast stations results in the required carriage of the broadcast signal of an out-of-state station rather than an in-state station, potentially weakening localism.41 This concern demonstrates that the underpinnings of the must- carry requirements is the protection of localism. If Web radio, or satellite radio, were to serve as an adequate alternative to FM radio, the FCC should first create similar must-carry regulations for telecom providers and satellite radio companies to ensure that localism is not weakened. However, these regulations do not yet exist. Without guarantees of a must-carry provision, the same sort that were imposed on the cable industry as it replaced broadcast television, alternate radio sources cannot serve as a proper guarantors of localism.

III. Conclusion

The rise of Internet music and the perceived declining importance of radio, combined with an economic downturn, has led many universities to sell their college radio stations. The plight of Rice University’s KTRU has risen to prominence as fans and staff of the student-created and student-run, award-winning station have moved from usual campus protests to legal appeals in an attempt to stop the sale of the station. While FCC publications and commissioners’ rhetoric have emphasized the importance of localism, legal precedent does not give KTRU supporters much in the way of support. However, Rice University’s recommendation that the Internet serve as a proper alternative does not stand up to scrutiny. Monetary restrictions and lacking must- carry requirements prevent the Web from serving as a proper replacement for FM radio.

32 Tim Stevens, Canalys: iPhone becomes most popular smartphone in the US, Android continues as most popular OS, ENGADGET, Nov. 1, 2010, available at http://www.engadget.com/ 2010/11/01/canalys-iphone-becomes-most-popular-smartphone-in-the-us-andro/.

I was rather proud of the Backpage at the time. The original drafts were a little too blunt (haha!) with some of the pot jokes, but then EIC David Brown helped smooth them out. In a depressing turn, apparently some Rice students did not quite get that map of Rice was supposed to be in the shape of North and South Korea, with North and South colleges at appropriate ends. But perhaps worse, some students didn’t even realize that was a map of Rice. Maybe if you don’t know what to look for, it is hard to see. Oh well.

Anyways, apparently James Baker’s wife, Susan Baker, has just written a book titled Passing It On. In an interview with the Houston Chronicle about her new book, Mrs. Baker demonstrated that either she is hilarious, or just doesn’t care anymore, or funny third thing, as she used the interview as an opportunity to talk about her sex life with the former Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, and Chief of Staff James Baker. I guess she wanted him to do to her what he did to the country during the 2000 election recount. (My jokes are so funny and topical!)

“I used to think I needed to be a good supportive wife, so I shouldn’t fuss or stomp around or be angry. But holding all that in makes you emotionally sick. So I started expressing my feelings. Jimmy was surprised at first, but over time, it gave him a new respect for me, and without a doubt deepened our relationship.”

She pauses for a second.

“Thank heavens for good sex. It can get you through a lot.”

I doubt that James Baker would request the original version of whatever Backpage is associated with this recent news event. As Tim Faust put it: The Baker Institute for Pubic Policy. Zing!

Last month, the Anti-Defamation League held a conference at Cardozo featuring famed mustache-haver John Bolton. I am not entirely sure why Bolton was there. He is not Jewish. According to Wikipedia, he is a Lutheran. But beyond this, he does not seem to have any actual experience concerning Judaism.

Leaving out Bolton’s actual policy positions, one cannot deny that he is a divisive political figure and a living totem of the controversial cowboy style diplomacy of the Bush administration. Touting Bolton as an ADL ally sends a message to liberal Jews (aka, most Jews) that the ADL is not a the organization for them. At Cardozo, this message was put into action when someone in the audience chewed out a young woman for expressing her difficulty reconciling liberal leanings with the conservative agents supporting Israel.

I guess you could say she was defamed to a certain extent. Irony!

Right now, the ADL is riding on its history and reputation. But scandals like this, and ADL chief Abe Foxman’s own controversial moments, risk damaging this important organization beyond repair. If the ADL keeps up like this, it will lose a generation of American Jews. And that is the actual problem (pdf: Mintz ADL column):

America is slowly losing its Jewish population. If the ADL actually cared about Judaism, it would work to create an atmosphere in the United States where young Jews feel proud of their heritage. However, pride is not exactly what one feels when the ADL condemns Borat, or Jewish settlers throw stones at IDF soldiers for protecting Palestinians. If the ADL wants to help protect Jewry in the long run, it should focus on projects that help make more Jews and keep current Jews Jewish, rather than play up divisive political projects.

Certainly Israel faces threats. But Israel has done a good job standing for itself. The ADL should perhaps worry about Jewish problems at home — the problems facing the American Jews at the ADL’s own panels.

First, thanks to Roxanna Maisel, whose line “I know lots of things, but most of them are wrong,” I stole for this column.

The Cardozo Jurist came out yesterday, and I have another column in it. Because the paper only comes out monthly, each column needs to be a real barn burner. No time to waste precious column space on pot or masturbating. I have a list of the big wheels at the law school, and each column will address one. Last month was the Dean, this month is law journals. And you can read all about it at the Jurist website! Or here. Or whatever. (pdf: Mintz oct column)

In addition to my column, the Dean wrote a response to my column from the previous issue, in which I accused him of general cowardice when it came to gay rights. Of course my column was mean, blunt and over the top. It was written by me, Evan! However, it does raise the question of whether gay rights should be viewed as a political matter or as one of civil and human rights. I think that it unequivocally should be the latter, and there is no room for compromise. A general written statement does not have the authority of a public statement, which I guess the Dean made in this letter. So I’m glad I could force him into that position, or some such.

Also, notice the redesign of the newspaper! It looks pretty darn cool. They finally bought inDesign.